Milling with BIL Mill and the 880

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Cut 5 more slabs on the big marri today so took a few photos of the mill in action.
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It's not easy to take pics by yourself while the mill is running so I tied a rope to the mill and the other end around my waist so all the pics looked the same - ie like this.
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The arrow points to the exhaust and shows how the sawdust is blown away from the operators feet by the exhaust.

I took a video but my phone takes very poor videos so they're not worth posting but if you are desperate I have put one on Utoob.
see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpgInDOi26E
To provide some forward pressure on the mill I threw the rope (still tied to the mill) over an axe handle held up in the air by the forks of the loader and then suspended my tool box from the rope. Chain really needed a sharpen at this point but it was still making plenty of sawdust.

I will have to find a decent video camera.
 
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I don't normally post on the milling forum but I use Castrol TTS synthetic in all my saws. You have to be sure that some of these fancy racing synthetics are suitable for air cooled engines - many are meant for water cooled motors and not suitable for chainsaws. Big W in Australia (like Walmart in the US I suppose?) has Castrol TTS for around AUD$26.50 per litre. I use this exclusively and have run 30:1 in my 3120XP but have now lowered that to 25:1.

Bob, you may already know but you shouldn't be running 40:1 in the bigger saws, 25:1 is recommended.
I spoke at length to the biggest Stihl dealer in Tassie last month who said all his loggers (rapidly diminishing with mechanical harvesting!) use 20-25:1 in their 660's. One of the guys who ran 50:1 had to get his saw rebuilt after a year with substantial internal wear even thought the saw ran well early. He now runs it on 20:1.
The Husky manual says that any of their saws >80cc should use 25:1, <80cc use 40-50:1.
 
I don't normally post on the milling forum but I use Castrol TTS synthetic in all my saws. You have to be sure that some of these fancy racing synthetics are suitable for air cooled engines - many are meant for water cooled motors and not suitable for chainsaws. Big W in Australia (like Walmart in the US I suppose?) has Castrol TTS for around AUD$26.50 per litre. I use this exclusively and have run 30:1 in my 3120XP but have now lowered that to 25:1.

Bob, you may already know but you shouldn't be running 40:1 in the bigger saws, 25:1 is recommended.
I spoke at length to the biggest Stihl dealer in Tassie last month who said all his loggers (rapidly diminishing with mechanical harvesting!) use 20-25:1 in their 660's. One of the guys who ran 50:1 had to get his saw rebuilt after a year with substantial internal wear even thought the saw ran well early. He now runs it on 20:1.
The Husky manual says that any of their saws >80cc should use 25:1, <80cc use 40-50:1.

I also went with my manual, its says 40:1 for the 076, same as what the manuals say for 070 and 090. I've run 40:1 with premium petrol in my old 076 for over two years and its running as sweet as it ever was. The guy who owned the 076 before me only said he ran it at 50:1! and he ran it for 10 years like that but fortunately he only ever cut firewood. The 076 piston was clean as a whistle when I first pulled the muffler off in 2007. Someone else told me the 25:1 thing was especially for milling so asked around at a couple of Stihl dealers, including one of the biggest in WA, and Jeff at the yard who has been using big saws for 25 years, and they all told me 25:1 is a bit of an urban myth still hanging around from the 50's and 60's. They all said use to 50:1 on modern stihls and if you are worried use 40:1. Jeff runs all his 660s, 084s and 880s at 50:1 and even mills with his 880 with 50:1. I don't want to have 2 different mixes on hand so I run 40:1 on the 880.

The grandfather of CS lumber making (Will Malloff) recommended in the early 1980s reducing the lube/petrol ratio by 4 parts in 24 or 1/6. So a 50:1 mix should be dropped to 41.7:1, and a 40:1 mix should be 33:3, which is still some way from 25:1. But even basic lubes have improved somewhat since then.

In January, when I ran Huds 3120 for a week, he likes to run 25:1 because he runs all is farm 2-stroke gear on 25:1, after an hour of running it with the exhaust blowing back at me I got a headache and it made me feel sick till I switched to upwind of the exhaust. Running the 076 on 40:1 up or down wind doesn't bother me at all. The other thing I noticed was after a couple of days of using the 3120 my chaps were black with the excess half burnt lube, and I have not been able to them clean despite repeated washing and soaking. What concerns me as much as the saw are the unburnt additives that come out with the unburnt lube. These are not good for you so I prefer to minimise my exposure to these.
 
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I also went with my manual, its says 40:1 for the 076, same as what the manuals say for 070 and 090. I've run 40:1 with premium petrol in my old 076 for over two years and its running as sweet as it ever was. The guy who owned the 076 before me only said he ran it at 50:1! and he ran it for 10 years like that but fortunately he only ever cut firewood. The 076 piston was clean as a whistle when I first pulled the muffler off in 2007. Someone else told me the 25:1 thing was especially for milling so asked around at a couple of Stihl dealers, including one of the biggest in WA, and Jeff at the yard who has been using big saws for 25 years, and they all told me 25:1 is a bit of an urban myth still hanging around from the 50's and 60's. They all said use to 50:1 on modern stihls and if you are worried use 40:1. Jeff runs all his 660s, 084s and 880s at 50:1 and even mills with his 880 with 50:1. I don't want to have 2 different mixes on hand so I run 40:1 on the 880.

The grandfather of CS lumber making (Will Malloff) recommended in the early 1980s reducing the lube/petrol ratio by 4 parts in 24 or 1/6. So a 50:1 mix should be dropped to 41.7:1, and a 40:1 mix should be 33:3, which is still some way from 25:1. But even basic lubes have improved somewhat since then.

In January, when I ran Huds 3120 for a week, he likes to run 25:1 because he runs all is farm 2-stroke gear on 25:1, after an hour of running it with the exhaust blowing back at me I got a headache and it made me feel sick till I switched to upwind of the exhaust. Running the 076 on 40:1 up or down wind doesn't bother me at all. The other thing I noticed was after a couple of days of using the 3120 my chaps were black with the excess half burnt lube, and I have not been able to them clean despite repeated washing and soaking. What concerns me as much as the saw are the unburnt additives that come out with the unburnt lube. These are not good for you so I prefer to minimise my exposure to these.

:agree2:

I been runnin kinda inbetween,, 45:1 and even in my old Mcc's never had a mins trouble...oils have come along way since the old days of using 30w and castor oil........
 
I also went with my manual, its says 40:1 for the 076, same as what the manuals say for 070 and 090. I've run 40:1 with premium petrol in my old 076 for over two years and its running as sweet as it ever was. The guy who owned the 076 before me only said he ran it at 50:1! and he ran it for 10 years like that but fortunately he only ever cut firewood. The 076 piston was clean as a whistle when I first pulled the muffler off in 2007. Someone else told me the 25:1 thing was especially for milling so asked around at a couple of Stihl dealers, including one of the biggest in WA, and Jeff at the yard who has been using big saws for 25 years, and they all told me 25:1 is a bit of an urban myth still hanging around from the 50's and 60's. They all said use to 50:1 on modern stihls and if you are worried use 40:1. Jeff runs all his 660s, 084s and 880s at 50:1 and even mills with his 880 with 50:1. I don't want to have 2 different mixes on hand so I run 40:1 on the 880.

The grandfather of CS lumber making (Will Malloff) recommended in the early 1980s reducing the lube/petrol ratio by 4 parts in 24 or 1/6. So a 50:1 mix should be dropped to 41.7:1, and a 40:1 mix should be 33:3, which is still some way from 25:1. But even basic lubes have improved somewhat since then.

In January, when I ran Huds 3120 for a week, he likes to run 25:1 because he runs all is farm 2-stroke gear on 25:1, after an hour of running it with the exhaust blowing back at me I got a headache and it made me feel sick till I switched to upwind of the exhaust. Running the 076 on 40:1 up or down wind doesn't bother me at all. The other thing I noticed was after a couple of days of using the 3120 my chaps were black with the excess half burnt lube, and I have not been able to them clean despite repeated washing and soaking. What concerns me as much as the saw are the unburnt additives that come out with the unburnt lube. These are not good for you so I prefer to minimise my exposure to these.

I understand where you're coming from Bob re: fumes. I haven't got my mill up and running yet to get gassed out! All I know is my warranty on my 3120 is void if I'm running the wrong mix and something goes wrong.
I just know that the guys running the bigger saws in Tassie day in day out doing logging won't run mixes over 25:1 anymore according to the Stihl dealer I was speaking to.
Is your 880 new Bob? If it is just make sure you'll be covered by warranty if you're running leaner mixes.
 
I understand where you're coming from Bob re: fumes. I haven't got my mill up and running yet to get gassed out! All I know is my warranty on my 3120 is void if I'm running the wrong mix and something goes wrong.
I just know that the guys running the bigger saws in Tassie day in day out doing logging won't run mixes over 25:1 anymore according to the Stihl dealer I was speaking to.
Is your 880 new Bob? If it is just make sure you'll be covered by warranty if you're running leaner mixes.

Sure I agree, go with with the manual says to maintain the warranty. The 880 was 8 months old but had never been used. No warranty because Stihl warranty on saws is not transferable in Australia but that suited me because I have modded it so that voids the warranty anyway and I used it as a lever to get it for just under 50% of RRP.
 
Sure I agree, go with with the manual says to maintain the warranty. The 880 was 8 months old but had never been used. No warranty because Stihl warranty on saws is not transferable in Australia but that suited me because I have modded it so that voids the warranty anyway and I used it as a lever to get it for just under 50% of RRP.

No worries Bob. Great deal there! Excellent in fact :)
Will also have to get in touch in how to fit my bar to the mill. The GB instructions were super lame at best and although I've got the mill together I can't work out how the auxillary oiler etc bolts to the bar tip. Hasn't concerned me a great deal at this stage as I haven't had the time to crank the mill up anyway :(
 

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